In Arms

The rush

My feet rush beneath me, swift, soundless, sure even in the dark, my lungs screaming, branches rushing at me, leaves grabbing at my hair, the wind stinging my eyes. We clear the forest, the hill. I hear the others, and the sparse lights of the village grow in size on this side of the river, I can see shuttered shops and quiet houses as we enter, street dogs waking in fright, barking, growling, whining, tails covering assholes scampering into the hills. People wake up in their houses but they do not move, remaining lights going off, eyes waiting, watching. We run at the police station, and they are ready for us; their guns go off first. There are drunken bullets in darkness and screams of the dying, but we break through, into the largest building in seven valleys except for the cinema hall, my gun jumping staccato in my arms, dislocating my shoulder, my sickle slashing, feeling warm blood and it is almost comforting in the cold. I cover for the others, and Comrade Ram is ordering all the while from the front. On the way out, I see our dead, red stars in disarray in the blue blackness, and I pick up after the Comrade in front chopping heads with his khukuri. It reminds me of Dashain, how my father would tether the goat and clear its head in one quick fall of arms. The Comrade in front sacrifices our red stars for victory, his khukuri falling heavy in the darkness. We do not let the enemy enjoy the dead of our numbers, so we take them with us, take their heads because their bodies are too heavy, take their heads so we can never be recognized. We are ghosts fighting in the blue blackness, and like a strong wind, we bring change, lift things up and leave them someplace else, shifting things, twisting directions; nameless, faceless. I run downriver and then up the hill, blood warm in my hands, heads in the bora bouncing like melons against the back of my knees.

I reach our base behind the trees, my feet sure, my directions perfectly mapped out even in the darkness. There are voices of survivors around me, rising and falling, weeping, laughing, whispering, the river gushing in the background. I see the familiar shape of a body slumped against a tree and I go to Sita. As I approach, I see the whites of her eyes, rolled up and backwards in her dark face. Her cheeks are puffed out and I realize someone has stuffed cloth in her mouth and taped it in. Her hands are extended behind her body, tied in a backward embrace to the trunk of the tree. I am trying to decide whether she was too loud or whether the men lost their minds, lost control of their bodies, lost their senses and decided to take it out on her. I don't know. We don't question here. We don't feel.

I sit against a tree, the bora by my side. I feel my wrist, feel the emptiness where the red glass bangle had been. I think of my daughter, feel her light weight in my arms. She must be sleeping right now, her breath coming slow and peaceful. I lift the gun off my shoulders and fling it some distance away. It falls with a metallic thud. I feel lightness, my shoulders relaxed, my breath steady. I hear a sound and I realize it is my heart, beating close to my ear, thud thudding in the blue blackness. I believe in ghosts.